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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28421145">The Candy Thief</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/TowerOfDango/pseuds/TowerOfDango'>TowerOfDango</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Lego Ninjago</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Gen, NInjago Calendar 2021 - October, Set during the beginning of Season 2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 18:42:16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,713</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28421145</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/TowerOfDango/pseuds/TowerOfDango</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Amongst the crunching of autumn leaves, spoopy decoration, and the pumpkins adding to the atmosphere, only one thing amiss.</p>
<p>And that was the mystery and horror of the Candy Thief...whoever that person may be.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Ninjago Calendar</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>The Candy Thief</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I know I don't have November, but still, give thanks to <a href="https://tokaywineandcheese.tumblr.com/">Xan (please click here)</a> and <a href="https://fronchtost.tumblr.com/">Soh (please also click here)</a> for everything that they've done and do. One of those things happen to be the <a href="https://ninjago-calendar.tumblr.com/">Ninjago Calendar for 2021 (second to last click, promise)</a>. </p>
<p>The artist for October is <a href="https://gierosajie.tumblr.com/">Gie (final clicky clicky)</a>, who is VERY talented, as evidenced by her other works.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Ooh, this looks nice!”</p>
<p>Nya’s excited exclamation bounced off the walls as she opened up the box in front of her. Jay paused in his own rummaging, the bat-and-skull reef he found taking a back seat as he took a look at Nya’s find.</p>
<p>Cobwebs.</p>
<p>Nice, nylon white lines that formed the symbol of terrifying arachnids.</p>
<p>Jay cleared his throat. “Yeah, yeah, it really does!” And, as if he wanted his eyes to be proven defective, he chirped, “…What is it?”</p>
<p>No dice. Nya gave no mercy. “Cobwebs, of course. Look at this.” She held it up, aiming it towards one of the sides closest to the doorway. “It’d go great in that corner over there.”</p>
<p>No longer could Jay hide his apprehension. “…U-Uhhm, eheheh, question…” His voice raised a pitch higher as he asked, “…Will it actually attract spiders here?”</p>
<p>Nya tapped her chin twice. “Hmn, good question.” She grinned knowingly at Jay. “Just in case, what kind of spiders tend to crawl around these parts?”</p>
<p>Jay blinked. “These pa—” Then he shook his head, before giving into a long-winded ramble. “Never mind, no time to share laughs over that. How about, instead of wondering what spider, we just—you know—not give them the chance to settle down here with their family, friends, acquaintances, and enemies?”</p>
<p>During Jay’s semi-speech, Nya’s eyes wandered to the other direction, mulling over the placement of her cobwebs.</p>
<p>Then her vision locked onto a new target. “I have a better idea.”</p>
<p>Jay followed Nya’s stare, landing onto where Master Wu sat as still as the tranquil meditation in which he was immersed. “Nya, what…”</p>
<p>With steps careful and light enough to impress any ninja or samurai, Nya crept over to the corner currently housing Master Wu. Innocently meditating as he was, Nya’s own innocence took back seat as she stood a foot away, spider’s silk hanging from her hands.</p>
<p>With a flourish, Nya unveiled the cobwebs before her and draped it over his meditating form.</p>
<p>Jay’s muted “pfft” made her turn around with a grin and she motioned to him, waving her hand pointedly over at her box. Jay peered in and understood immediately.</p>
<p>It was cobwebs galore--some plain, others with ghosts, some with spiders (‘<em> Very fake spiders </em>,’ Jay told himself), and most importantly: Perfect to decorate Master Wu with.</p>
<p>Jay upturned his hand while raising his arm slightly, giving her a claws-up before promptly digging into the box.</p>
<p>With steps half as careful, yet somehow graceful, Jay hurried over while holding the remaining cobwebs over his head like an ominously flowing cape. But before he could just haphazardly chuck it over Master Wu’s perfectly upright form, Nya waved her hand.</p>
<p>“I already did that, we have to do it a different way, Jay,” she said.</p>
<p>Jay decides, right then, to snicker. “Heheheh, Way, Jay.”</p>
<p>Giving an affectionately exasperated shake of the head, she made a motion over her thighs. “You put one over his lap, I’ll put one on each of his shoulders.”</p>
<p>Jay remembered, right then, why Nya was and is awesome. “Brilliant.”</p>
<p>Nothing could stop Nya and Jay’s mission now.</p>
<p>Not even Cole rushing in, the clacks of his steps announcing he was not to be ignored.</p>
<p>“OKAY!” Cole bellowed, righteous fury written all over the four letters. “WHO—”</p>
<p>Nya and Jay were immediate with their response. “SHHHHH,” they just as furiously returned.</p>
<p>Cole cleared his throat and tried again. “…Okay. Who—” he interrupted his furious whisper to blink at the scene in front of him. “What are you two…” He shook his head. “…Nope, nevermind, no time to share laughs over that.” He went back to pointing accusingly at the two. “Who took one of the candy bags we were supposed to give out?”</p>
<p>Nya shrugged, continuing to place her spider cloak over Master Wu’s shoulders. “How are we supposed to know? We were here the whole time.”</p>
<p>Jay followed suit, dropping his web over Master Wu’s lap, standing akimbo over his work. “Yeah, look at how obviously hard we’re working at making Master Wu one with the Halloween decorations.”</p>
<p>Cole wasn’t listening, pressing his hooked hands against his face. “This is a disaster. A DISAS—”</p>
<p>Nya and Jay were immediate in emulating a broken record. “SHHHH!!”</p>
<p>Throwing his hands to the side, Cole staged-whispered once more, “A disaster. That is why I made sure to buy seven bags. Seven. Because I’ve seen what happens if you run out of candy before 8pm in this city. Do you know what happens?” He walked over to Jay, shaking him by the shoulders. “Do you??”</p>
<p>Nya and Jay were simultaneous as they went back to perfecting the positions of their cobwebs. “We don’t.”</p>
<p>Cole paced back and forth as he regaled his tale. “I’ve witnessed it with my own eyes. No sidewalk in this city was safe from them.” He began to shudder. “The trick-or-treating Sidewalkers”</p>
<p>Nya made a ‘hmm’-ing sound. Whether from what Cole said or because she was trying to figure out the best way to place her cobwebs, it was unknown. “Why sidewalks?”</p>
<p>“That’s a horrible villain name,” Jay piped up.</p>
<p>Cole went back to pointing at the two, sternly correcting them. “What you should be saying is ‘thank Ninjago that it’s only sidewalks’. There was one shop owner who refused to give real candy, instead giving cough drops. His sidewalk was never the same.”</p>
<p>Nya raised an eyebrow at Cole. “What’s the big deal with some eggs or toilet paper on some cement?”</p>
<p>Jay shuddered, to which Nya looks at him confusedly. He looked seriously at her and just spoke one word: “Cement.”</p>
<p>Nya nodded, as if Jay’s one-word response was perfectly logical. “Ah.”</p>
<p>Cole waved his arms wildly about. “Excuse me! It wasn’t just eggs! It was eggs mixed and…” He lowered his voice ominously. “…oobleck.”</p>
<p>Dramatically, Nya and Jay gasped.</p>
<p>“No,” said Nya. “Not oobleck.”</p>
<p>“Oh wait,” Jay said, turning in the circle-mouth for a wide grin. “I love oobleck!”</p>
<p>“Me too,” Cole said without missing a beat. “But that’s not the point. Do you get it now? We have to find the missing candy bag! This is no time for lazing around!”</p>
<p>Jay immediately protested at that. “Hey! This is not lazing around, thank you very much.”</p>
<p>Nya suddenly huffed out a laugh and it wasn’t because of Jay’s antics. “Actually, now that I think about it…” She turned to her teacher made DIY Halloween décor. “…Master Wu, is the culprit I’m thinking about the same culprit you’re thinking about?”</p>
<p>Eyes still closed, legs still crossed, and hands not moving an inch, Master Wu spoke up without fail. “Sharp as ever, Nya.”</p>
<p>Jay had a different concern to squawk about. “You were <em> aware </em> this whole time!?”</p>
<p>“Silence and stillness is not the automatic equivalency to <em> un </em>awareness,” Master Wu simply returned.</p>
<p>“Uh. Most of the time, it <em> does </em>.”</p>
<p>“Master Wu,” Cole butted in. “Who’s the culprit?”</p>
<p>At this, Master Wu opened one eye, a meaningful glint in his half stare. “When the future yields no answers, it’s best to try peering into the past.”</p>
<p>Simultaneously, Jay and Cole groaned.</p>
<p>Then first came Jay’s whine. “What does that even mean?”</p>
<p>And followed, without missing a beat, with Cole’s begging. “Sensei, please.”</p>
<p>Nya was the one to save them. “Oh where, oh where, has our green ninja gone?”</p>
<p>At that, realization struck Cole with a backflip into the air as he bolted out of the room. The last words that could be heard from him was foreboding as it was…weird. “I KNEW he wasn’t actually doing jaw strengthening practice in the kitchen!”</p>
<p>As soon as Cole left, in came the Snack Bearers, comforting and familiar scents wafting through the air.</p>
<p>“Why would Lloyd be practicing jaw strengthening exercises?” Zane was the first to speak up, not even phased by Master Wu covered in cobwebs. “Should we do that as well?”</p>
<p>In his hands, a plate of pumpkin-shaped cookies with various faces were piled high on a platter, looking adorable just as it was impressive. On the other hand—surprise, surprise—Dareth’s platter was piled high with puffy pot stickers, golden brown as it was delicious.</p>
<p>“Hah!” Dareth exhaled, jutting out his jaw briefly before proudly continuing, “I already perfected that art in the first year of my martial arts career. It’s on one of my trophies.”</p>
<p>“There’s a competition for that?” Nya asked as she finally nodded at her finished cobweb art.</p>
<p>Jay, however, wasn’t quite satisfied, adjusting a corner near Master Wu’s knees. “Pretty sure there’s a competition for everything.”</p>
<p>Before anyone can respond to that, Lloyd came bursting in, an opened bag of candy held incriminatingly in his arms. In just mere, impressive seconds, he smoothly ran in between Zane and Dareth, barely brushing them. It allowed Zane to act as the stabilizer for his pastries, finding the center of gravity of his pyramid cookies just fine.</p>
<p>Dareth, however…</p>
<p>“No!” Dareth cried as the platter wobbled. My puffy pot!” As if in slow motion, a pot sticker slid off the plate, about to meet it’s doom on the wooden floors. </p>
<p>Lloyd was quick to act, pausing in his forward escape to back-up with quick footing and a matrix-style backwards bend, Lloyd captured the doughy creation between his teeth.  A feral “MMPH” escaped his bared teeth and without letting of his confectionary treasure once, he ran over to the other side of the room.</p>
<p>Zane’s smile was proud as it was unassuming, as if this was a normal occurrence (…it’s not). “Ah, so Lloyd is doing well in his jaw-strengthening exercise.”</p>
<p>Huffs started approaching the room and, this time, Dareth practically ran out of the way lest any more of his puffy pots were to become victims to the floor or Lloyd’s mouth. It was just in time for Kai to come bursting through as well, taking a page out of Cole’s book to point accusingly at Lloyd.</p>
<p>“Lloyd!” Kai cried out. “Come on, I counted twelve candy wrappers, that’s enough!”</p>
<p>“Why!?” Lloyd protested, protectively curled over his trove of candy treasure. “There are still six bags of candy left, so it shouldn’t be a big deal if I get one of them!”</p>
<p>Kai shook his head, stepping closer to Lloyd. “That’s not the point! What about your stomach and teeth, huh?” he said, as if he were begging for Lloyd to think about his words.</p>
<p>And Lloyd…</p>
<p>…Well, Lloyd did. “Uh?” he intoned, before slowly asking, “What about them??” He looked confused, as if Kai’s words were ones he never expected to hear from him. As if he didn’t understand why Kai was saying them in the first place.</p>
<p>Kai looked almost relived that, this time, Lloyd was asking rather than trying to find an escape route. “You’re going to give yourself a stomachache if you eat that much and put yourself at risk for cavities!”</p>
<p>Nya piped up this time, teasingly saying, “You should listen to him, Lloyd, he’s speaking from experience.”</p>
<p>Kai bemoaned his fate as he looked betrayed at his sister. “Oh, come on, Nya!”</p>
<p>Jay’s wolfish grin said it all, somehow adding a devious edge to his nod. “Heh, the dirt she has on you, man.”</p>
<p>Kai’s mouth froze in a half open position. “Wait, what dir—” Then with a facepalm, he changed directions. “Nevermind, no time to freak out about that.”</p>
<p>“So what if I get a stomach ache?” Lloyd asked, going back to the matter on hand. His confused expression never changed as he added, “Or cavities?”</p>
<p>“You’ll put yourself in unnecessary pain, Lloyd,” Kai answered, as if it was a no-brainer. His face softened with the concern that subconsciously poured into his next question. “Do you want that?”</p>
<p>“We don’t,” Zane added, straightforward for once.</p>
<p>From where he sat, Master Wu finally shifted his hands, eyes both open this time as he looked gently at Lloyd through the openings of his cobwebs. “Families work tirelessly and without fail to protect each other. Even from the smallest things that, at first, seem harmless.”</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Dareth called out, all the while munching on his pot stickers. “Whuf he shed.”</p>
<p>And in a true down-to-earth fashion, Cole suddenly came crashing back into the picture, taking on a heroic pose as he pointed authoritatively at the candy thief.</p>
<p>“I found you!” Cole proudly proclaimed, marching over to the culprit as he held out his hand. “Give it up, Lloyd, and I’ll—”</p>
<p>Suddenly, his outstretched hand met an open candy bag.</p>
<p>“Here,” Lloyd murmured, not meeting Cole’s eyes as he held out the item he so closely protected.</p>
<p>Cole almost…pouted. “Oh. That…” Yep. He was pouting. “…was disappointing.”</p>
<p>Lloyd shrugged, stilling looking down to the side with furrowed eyes and a guilty frown. “Sorry,” he mumbled this time, feet shifting.</p>
<p>Almost immediately, everyone looked at each other with a sort of desperation to keep that expression off Lloyd’s face.</p>
<p>Cole was the one to blurt out a possible solution. “Should we tell him, you guys?”</p>
<p>Everyone inwardly cheered as Lloyd instantly looked up at that, the guilt interrupted by curiosity. “Tell me what?”</p>
<p>“Weeellll,” Nya teasingly drawled. “We were going to surprise you later on, but I guess the cat’s out of the bag.”</p>
<p>Jay looked over at his partner-in-crime, tilting his head to the side. “You’re choosing interesting turn-of-phrases lately.”</p>
<p>Kai was the one to explain, walking up next to Cole so that Lloyd could feel the full force of his bright smile. “We pooled together money to get special chocolates for you.”</p>
<p>Dareth audibly gulped down the puffy pot sticker in his mouth, freeing up one hand to flick his nose with self-labeled importance. “I got you the best ones, of course.”</p>
<p>Kai rolled his eyes, even as his smile never faded. “AND all of ours is way more delicious then the generic trick or treat ones.” He reached over to place a hand on Lloyd’s shoulder. “We were going to give it you in portions so you wouldn’t make yourself sick eating it all on one go.”</p>
<p>Llyod pursed his lips, eyes angled down at the candy bag now in Cole’s hand. “And you’re…still going to give it to me?” His voice became small. “Even after I stole the candies?”</p>
<p>“You gave it back, didn’t you?” Kai pointed out, voice kind.</p>
<p>“I ate some of it…” Lloyd still hesitantly pointed out.</p>
<p>Cole was the one to shrug at this. Not even his fear of eggs and oobleck could keep him from comforting Lloyd. Besides…“Well, honestly, I’d rather give it to you then the Sidewalkers.”…there <em> was </em> a silver-lining to this.</p>
<p>“Sidewalkers?” Dareth asked, his puffy pot inches from his mouth. “Did I miss something here?” He inserted a dramatic paused before delivering the punchline: “You <em> dare </em> keep me out of the loop?”</p>
<p>And the drama was pointedly allowed to fly over everyone’s heads.</p>
<p>Because.</p>
<p>Well.</p>
<p>Respond to it is the same as enabling it and they’d very much like <em> not </em> to enable it.</p>
<p>“Aside from that,” Master Wu sighed. “I think the lesson you learned from this incident is far more valuable than the candies themselves, wasn’t it?” he concluded, chuckling as Lloyd gave a shy nod.</p>
<p>Lloyd looked back up with a smile, the gratitude he felt much warmer then the taste of any chocolate or candy. “Yeah…thanks, everyone,” he said, taking that moment to look at each and everyone’s faces. And then his eyes landed on Master Wu and he did a doubletake. “Wait, why are you covered in cobwebs?”</p>
<p>Jay coughed at that. “Uhm…”</p>
<p>Nya glanced at Master Wu before turning her stare towards the box that was a few feet away. “Well…”</p>
<p>Zane walked over, never once letting go of his plate of cookies, then tilted his head to the side. “I think Master Wu looks quite fetching,” he announced, nodding approvingly.</p>
<p>Master Wu nodded back. “Thank you, Zane. I think I do too.” Master Wu went back to perfect posture, eyes closing as his hands went back to position. “Well. Carry on, all of you.”</p>
<p>At that, everyone laughed freely, the sound ringing pleasantly throughout the room.</p>
<p>“You heard the man,” Nya stated, going over to grab more cobwebs in hand, plus some extra to hand over to Jay. “Carry on.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Thank you for reaching the end of this, it's probably obvious that it's my first time writing for this fandom, so I hope it was still enjoyable. ^^</p>
<p>*Raises glass* A toast for October 2021, because we were able to get through October 2020. *Clink*</p></blockquote></div></div>
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